Chapter 414 - 360: Jin Xueli: Do Not Peer, Do Not Go Deep, Unrelenting Pursuit (2)

'Do I have the advantage now?'

The hate-face balloon's sharp screeching suddenly cut off. It went from twisting and struggling to perfectly still, so fast it was as if someone had flipped a switch.

"What is this feeling," it murmured softly, as if afraid of startling someone. "Where are you going?"

Jin Xueli was startled by its question. She subconsciously glanced at the elevator control panel, and all the hair on her body stood on end.

[ELEVATOR DESCENDING ↓]

'I didn't press any buttons, did I? Why would the elevator suddenly—'

'Wait, that's right. That's how elevators work.'

'If the person in the elevator doesn't do anything for a while, and someone on another floor needs to go up or down, the elevator will respond to the call from the other floor...'

'In other words, in the basement levels... something called the elevator?'

"Go back!" Jin Xueli forgot all about the balloon. She let it go and frantically slapped the button marked "G," crying out, "I want to go back to the Ground Floor!"

Aside from the rooftop, none of the other floors in the elevator seemed like a place she could leave from and get home alive. Even with the three face-balloons waiting for her on the rooftop of Luo's Hill Mansion, it was still far better than—

"Arriving at Basement Level 9."

A mechanical female voice startled her. 'This elevator has an announcer?'

"If this is not your destination floor, please refrain from observing the outside or other passengers."

'...What was Basement Level 9 again?'

Jin Xueli's hand was still on the G button. In that instant, her Hunter's instinct made her shut her eyes.

-9: __Nest-in-Nest Dark-Pit-Bottom-Nest Backroom-Floor/Location of Jin Xueli and Hate-Face Balloon__

She kept her eyes squeezed shut, her body tensed up, almost pressing herself against the elevator's control panel.

She could hear the sound of the elevator doors slowly parting, just like any ordinary elevator in the human world.

She heard the hate-face balloon let out a "Hm?"

"This is the Nest?" The hate-face balloon seemed to let out a sigh of relief, though it was unclear who it was asking.

Something outside the elevator gave a muffled reply that seemed to say, "Yes."

"So it really is the Nest..." the hate-face balloon seemed to say as it floated out of the elevator, its voice growing more distant from Jin Xueli. "Taking such a long detour, so annoying..."

The second sentence quickly faded outside the elevator.

Jin Xueli couldn't feel if anything had entered the elevator. She just kept hammering the G button, pressing so hard her finger began to ache. 'It should have lit up by now, right?'

She kept her eyes shut, not knowing if the button had responded this time. Only after the elevator doors closed again did a sudden realization strike her, and she hastily took two steps back.

'...Usually, after someone gets on an elevator, they need to select their floor.'

Whatever had just gotten on, Jin Xueli did not want to stand between it and the control panel.

"Thanks," said a muffled voice that was clearly capable of human speech. "You can open your eyes."

The elevator announcer immediately chimed in: "Please do not stare at passengers who can be seen."

"Really, you can open your eyes."

"Please do not stare at passengers who can be seen."

"Don't be fooled by it..."

"Arriving at Basement Level 5," the elevator announcer cut off the voice. "If this is not your destination floor, please refrain from observing the outside or other passengers."

The voice fell silent. Then came the sound of the elevator doors opening and closing again.

'Did... did it get off? It was going to Basement Level 5, right?'

Terrified it was a trap, Jin Xueli still kept her eyes tightly shut, not daring to open them. She fumbled for the control panel, found the G button from memory, and, as if reading Braille, identified the shape of the G with her fingertips before frantically pressing it again.

When the announcement "Arriving at Ground Floor" rang out, Jin Xueli suddenly realized the back of her shirt was soaked with cold sweat.

She only dared to open her eyelids a tiny crack. Through that blurry slit, obscured by her eyelashes, she finally saw the building's rooftop again.

...That was right. It was the same place she had fallen from. Even the shallow groove the angry-face balloon had scraped into the ground was still there.

"I feel it," the smile-face balloon chuckled from a distance. "It went back to the Nest! That's great!"

"So that woman's Path is falling from a great height," the sad-face balloon said mournfully. "I'm so sad we couldn't kill her, the Knight Family..."

"Let's go get Little Hate back first who gives a fuck about the Knight Family let them die"

Jin Xueli kept her hand on the "open door" button. Only after the three balloons in the distance had vanished from the sky did she rush a few steps, stumbling back onto the rooftop. Throughout the entire process, she never dared to look back at the "elevator."

'...What if next time I activate the elevator, there's already a passenger inside?'

'Some "welcome surprise gift." She was right. Anything the Nest offers up on its own is never a good thing.'

'What in the world did I just go through?'

'Was the place the hate-face balloon entered really the Nest?'

'No... No matter how I think about it, it feels like it's never coming back.'

Jin Xueli collapsed onto the rooftop floor, gasping for breath for a long moment, but no answers came.

She only knew that she now had one more "thing she was most unwilling to do"—get in an elevator.

The sky, weighed down by water-logged clouds, hung lower and lower, as if about to press down on her head.

In the nearby buildings... someone might have already recorded everything that just happened.

But Jin Xueli could hardly bring herself to worry about what would happen if it was posted online. 'As long as they were far away, they won't get a clear shot of my face... People might just think it's a TV show being filmed.'

After the adrenaline rush subsided, all that was left were her weak, trembling limbs.

Jin Xueli reassembled her hammer, patted down all her pockets, and finally found her phone. Staring at the screen, however, she wasn't sure who she should call to tell she was safe.

'Amber? But I'm being hunted, and my location was just discovered. Contacting her now might just bring her trouble.'

'Who could I tell... without worrying about getting them involved?'

She looked at the name "Chaisi" in her contact list. She was about to press it but then remembered he wouldn't pick up. Chaisi had been missing for days, with no word on whether he was dead or alive.

'If he were still around, I wouldn't be in this mess at all. The root of all these problems was his sudden disappearance, which meant he could no longer provide Scott with the Original Liquid.'

'Calling him so many times before was useless. Trying to find him now would be meaningless too.'

'But the Knight Family is hunting me, and when you get right down to it, it's all because of the Kai Family. The Kai Family has to help, right?'

After some thought, she settled for the next best thing and sent a message to Tian Xi. It took all her self-control not to add five or six exclamation points after every sentence.

'I can't stay here long...' As soon as she sent the message, she felt some strength return to her limbs. She quickly scrambled up from the ground and grabbed her backpack.

Jin Xueli turned around just in time to see the door to the rooftop stairwell being pushed open.

Behind the slowly opening door was a strange man.

As he walked step by step onto the rooftop, she saw that the color of his irises covered his entire eyes, leaving not a speck of white.

He looked at Jin Xueli with those cavernous eyes and smiled.

"I'm surprised. Even those balloons couldn't take your life, Miss Jin Xueli."